A strong team of 6 GoodGymers came today to support a big group of Pitshanger junior parkrunners and got a shout out from the run director Amanda. The word "GoodGym" caused a nice applause as opposed to silence after the mention of the lost property.

"Quality merchandise!" - David

There were no takers for the two lost hoodies. Maybe the runners prefer to take home other things? Read on!

Harvey was spared the pressure of the timekeeping after running the London Marathon in reverse overnight. He joined the GoodGym cohort of marshals, alongside Afsar, Anuj, Madiha and Sevan.

Kash stayed at the start and helped set up just a little bit wonky funnel, then assumed the barcode scanning role alongside another volunteer, Christina. The two scanners had to handle a whopping 90 barcodes - probably a record number of attendees since the pandemic! They tried to get ahead of time and started sorting the tokens from the very beginning of the scanning process. The brilliant idea fired back at them when a couple of tokens were blown away by a sudden gust of wind. The scanners retrieved the barcodes quickly but at the end they discovered that number three was still missing. It was nowhere to be found in the grass. Maybe someone took it home?

Windy Sunday morning and Steph Ducat ran to Pitshanger Junior Parkrun and grew a tail 😂 as was the tail walker/runner. Great day as this week marks a remarkable milestone for Junior parkrun's journey that began in 2010 : 14 years of junior parkrun. Starting with just nine young pioneers at Bushy Park in 2010 and has now grown into over 450 events in 3 countries making an impact on the health and happiness of numerous children, families and volunteers. Strange enough it was Steph's 14th Junior Parkrun volunteering. After the warm up, the children went off followed by the tail walker. One lap in the 2 last tiny runners said they were stopping : great effort as they were very young. Steph then had to catch up with the last person and noticed he was a supporter and team player of the Brentford Penguins Football Club which is a charity run by ex-professional footballer Allan Cockram. He was running with his dad and then started slightly walking, but then they started skipping and running. Steph then took part and we had 3 skipping along the course. Near the finish line, the last marshal joined the trio and we had a great skip or hip hop to the finish line with families cheering. We had a kangaroo of a time bouncing around to the finish line.

It's a good thing that St. Patrick's day is on Sunday night this year, not Saturday. If it was a day earlier, many of the Junior parkrunners might not have rolled out or their beds and into their running shoes this morning after some late night partying.

A Sunday St. Pats also worked well for the GoodGymers in attendance, who can raise a glass tonight and not worry about leaving the Run Director in the lurch. There's only work to worry about on Monday morning after all.

This morning Harvey and Madhan were barcode scanning and Sevan was a timekeeper. Harvey also did some funnel management, putting stakes into the ground to make a cone rather a funnel, that was narrower at the start than the end.

There were a lot of marshals around the course this morning and Steph and Kash were assigned to marshal points 1 and 2 respectively. Kash was paired up with another marshal and given an important extra duty, to politely block corner cutters looking to shave a few seconds off their time. Kash agreed, told herself that none shall pass and none did.

Despite the wet weather, 33 runners made it around the course and through the funnel, managing to slide through a muddy spot that caught a few out.

The rain had been coming down all night, stopping only half an hour before the start of today's Pitshanger Junior parkrun. With the sun starting to peek out, Kash and Sevan arrived to find that the Brent River had burst its banks, submerging part of the regular course 🌊. With no way of drying the route and keeping the participants safe, it was time to put the "alternate route" plan into action.

The run director, David, was trying to remember what the alternate course layout was. Apparently they'd only needed to use it twice in the last 9 years. The 39 brave runners would cut across the grass before reaching the river. The tail walker would later say

"The grass is one big puddle"

The run director organised their marshals on the unfamiliar route and briefed them on how to direct the runners

"There's a red cone where the runners rejoin the normal path from the muddy wasteland" - Run Director

Kash and Sevan were both marshalling with Sevan spending most of the parkrun saying "go left". On the second lap, the leading girl sighed at him and said "Yeah. I know". Most did appreciate the guidance though.

No one was lost to the river and surprisingly, there weren't many muddy runners on the route by the end. It's pretty much guaranteed that they were all soaked through below the knee, though.

We were back at Pitshanger Junior parkrun today for our regular monthly volunteering session. This is down from a bumper 3 visits in December, including helping at their 400th event on Xmas Eve and back to our normal routine.

There was a glut of volunteers again today as Pitshanger are building a good community of adult and Duke of Edinburgh helpers. We had 4 GoodGymers around the course too, with Madhan barcode scanning and Sevan timekeeping, while Steph was at marshal post 7 and Kash at 8.5. The number of volunteers was matched by a strong showing of runners, with 66 (or 67) finishing the course.

There were a couple of unexpected extras. As well as Kash finding herself in an extra marshal post, there was also a runner who crossed the finish line after the tailwalker had removed their hi-vis and the time keepers had gone to submit their results. Cue confusion with the Run Director and organisers.

We'll be back again on the 17th of February, the third Sunday of the month.

Last Pitshanger Junior Parkrun for 2023 : event 401 with 41 Junior runners. 2 goodgymers Madhan and Steph Ducat at the last event of the year. Wet and muddy course, but don't mud-sunderestimate the power of a good mud run! Both of the godgymers were posted at muddy areas with massive puddles. We had a few tough mudders today and went straight through the puddles and a little dirt never hurt anyone. The junior runners were all just ‘muddling’ through! Perfect way to ‘mud’-ulate their fitness! After the race both Madhan and Steph walked to a coffee shop to get a hot beverage and cake as they were getting cold despite a bit of sunshine 🌞. After a few minutes both Frosties were nice and warm.